One question that comes up often is why archers can't shoot over other units by default? Why do you guys think this design decision was made? I have to imagine they were able to at first (seems the natural way of things), and then the playtesters / designers found them to be too powerful? Having terrain and units block LOS does make the maneuvering more interesting as well.

Thoughts?

Well there are two ways to get past this. Heartseeker and elevated Terrain. I personally think it is a good idea you can't hide archers behind blocks of infantry with no way to shoot them.

Yeah, probably because it makes the maneuvering even more significant. Also, it keeps the capacity to shoot over units as a special ability for future units, like dwarf artillery... ;-)

Design decision most definitely. Now they could do a "Hail of Arrows" upgrade or something to shoot up (i.e. no line of sight needed), but only doing damage if you have an accuracy.

Balance most likely.

If archers basically had a heartseeker built in then people would just mass archers and get a wide speedbump to screen them off melee. Which would be rather dull in the end.

Because it's boring.

Runewars is, at its heart, a game of planning, position, and maneuver. Players are rewarded for having good plans and positioning themselves well.

Nobody should be rewarded for putting one unit behind another.

As it is, it's still possible to do, but you pay a price for it and can only do it once (Heartseeker).

If it needs a fluff justification: The units in question are too small for overhead massed volley fire to be effective. Archers in Runewars depend on direct target fire to maximize effectiveness.

1 hour ago, flightmaster101 said:

Design decision most definitely. Now they could do a "Hail of Arrows" upgrade or something to shoot up (i.e. no line of sight needed), but only doing damage if you have an accuracy.

What about an upgrade that lets you ignore line of sight but only shot forward. Makes positioning still important as it will be easier to arc dodge. However it would still be powerful.

Shooting over a rank while judging the distance and being effective is decidedly quite difficult. It would have a lot more significant friendly fire

BattleLore answer: They aren't on a hill.

2 hours ago, Darthain said:

Shooting over a rank while judging the distance and being effective is decidedly quite difficult. It would have a lot more significant friendly fire

This. I know this is a fantasy game, but there is actually surprisingly little historical evidence of archers being deployed behind infantry and firing indirectly over them. Much more evidence of them as skirmishers before the main forces engaged (classical) or employed on the flanks of the infantry (i.e. Hundred Years' War). Particularly against any kind of armored enemy, direct fire was exponentially more effective than an indirect shot.

I suspect it was a game mechanics decision but I'd like to think that someone might have thought the realism of it was a nice added bonus.

Sorry...I like history...

edit: also I'd love to see an army pull off initial ranged skirmish attacks and then have the archers fall back as the infantry advance, but I don't know if this game is designed in a way to make that viable.

Archers historically were either on a perch or flanking, not behind infantry.

Unless they were up on a tall hill they usually couldnt even see their target, and they werent going to blindly lob arrows when their friends were charging in. Not to mention arrows are expensive so you dont want to waste them.

Shooting over other troops did occur regularly among certain armies. For example, late Roman (Byzantine) had that specific tactic in their manuals, such as the one in Maurikius (that is not the only one-see the thematic period). It is also described in Arrian.

Generally speaking, these armies in the game, like most fantasy armies, seem more akin to the less rigorous feudal period armies rather than more strictly drilled units in earlier times. As referred to above, it could easily be handled with a training card for a particular unit, as well as potentially a requirement on the card that the friendly unit you're shooting over must be at range one. Easier to make sure you're not hitting them if you're close to them.

Also, this is a game, and a fantasy one at that. So realism is great, but when it comes at the cost of interesting gameplay then it is undesirable

In this case, having to manoeuvre your units around abstract terrain and arbitrary line of sight makes this game the most interesting I've played in a very long while so I'm all for it, however historically accurate (or not) it might be

I played a game were 'good' couldnt shoot engaged forces period. But bad guys could. I definitely prefer it this way.

I would also like something more drastic when shooting into mêlée, such as having a panic test with severity equal to the shooter threat, and blanks counting as hits on the ally

Dont agree with the severity thing since you can still spend panic tokens to increase the severity, ive had a few times where it actually screwed over the owner's unit because i drew the 2 panic token one, then i attacked, caused a test (sev3), and forced them to turn around before they attacked. Lost their rerolls, and now i am considered flanking them.

However i do agree about the blank thing. Blanks arent really that common, for one unlike games like xwing the die isnt half blanks but also the amount of rerolling rerolls in this game mitigate it alot. So if you do get it, counting as a hit to your engaged unit makes sense (closest one to you in case theres multiple, while they all suffer the morale part).

In Warzone Resurrection there is a similar mechanic. Shooting into melee cuts your aim down by 8 (D20 based game, you want to roll equal or lower than your skill), and if you miss the shot but didnt exceed your normal aim skill you actually hit your own dude. If you exceeded your normal aim skill you just missed entirely no harm no fowl. I had a game once where my opponent kept doing this and actually did more damage to himself than i did rofl

My favorite historical element of Runewars has to be the animated human skeletons.

7 minutes ago, Tvayumat said:

My favorite historical element of Runewars has to be the animated human skeletons.

My favorite historical documentary is Army of Darkness for this very reason.

3 hours ago, Tvayumat said:

My favorite historical element of Runewars has to be the animated human skeletons.

Not the demonically mutated desert barbarians?

1 hour ago, flightmaster101 said:

Not the demonically mutated desert barbarians?

Maybe it wasn't a pact with demons. Maybe just a few centuries of inbreeding (since nobody sleeps with a warboy *cough* I mean berserker). The flesh rippers are just German shepherds after years of selective breeding.